Hollywood actress Blake Lively has filed a legal complaint against Justin Baldoni, her co-star in the recent flick ‘It Ends with Us’. In her lawsuit, the actress alleged sexual harassment along with a social media campaign to “destroy” her reputation. The legal filing states that Lively accused MrBaldoni and his team of attacking her public image. This happened after a meeting where the actress brought along her husband Ryan Reynolds to address “repeated sexual harassment and other disturbing behavior” by Baldoni and a producer on the film.
Baldoni, the director and lead actor in the film ‘It Ends with Us’ is not silent on these allegations. His team told the media that the allegations were “categorically false”. The legal team stated that they hired a crisis manager only after Lively had threatened to derail the film unless her demands were met right away. In the Romance Drama, Lively portrays the role of an independent florist who is in a relationship with a charming yet physically abusive man, played by Justin Baldoni. The story was adapted from the book of the same name by Collen Hoover.
The meeting between Lively and Baldoni took place on January 4th of this year. The meeting also involved others in the movie production. The legal filing states that this meeting was to discuss “the hostile work environment” on set. Ms.Lively’s husband, the ‘Deadpool’ actor Ryan Reynolds also joined her at the showdown. Needless to say, Reynolds did not appear in the movie. Baldoni attended the meeting in his capacity as co-chairman and co-founder of Wayfarer Studios, the company that produced the film. He was also the director of the movie.
Lively’s lawyers in the legal statement allege that both Baldoni and the Wayfarer chief executive officer, Jamey Heath engaged in “inappropriate and unwelcome behavior towards Ms. Lively and others on the set of It Ends with Us”. The legal filing was done to the California Civil Rights Department which contained a list of 30 demands relating to the pair’s alleged misconduct was made at the meeting to ensure they could continue to produce the film.
Among the list of 30 demands made by Blake Lively, she requested that there would be no more mention of Baldoni and Heath’s previous “pornography addiction” to Lively or any other female crew members. The list also mentions that there would be no more descriptions of their own genitalia to Ms. Lively, and “no more adding of sex scenes, oral sex, or on camera climaxing by BL [Blake Lively] outside the scope of the script BL approved when signing onto the project”. Lively also demanded that Baldoni needs to stop saying that he could talk to her dead father.
Blake Lively’s legal team further accuses Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios of leading a “multi-tiered plan” to wreck the actress’ reputation. The ‘Gossip Girl’ actress further alleges it was “the intended result of a carefully crafted, coordinated, and resourced retaliatory scheme to silence her, and others from speaking out about the hostile environment that MrBaldoni and Mr Heath created”.
Responding to this legal complaint Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, said on Saturday, “It is shameful that Ms Lively and her representatives would make such serious and categorically false accusations against MrBaldoni, Wayfarer Studios, and its representatives.” He then accused Lively of making numerous demands, including “threatening to not show up to set, threatening to not promote the film”, which would end up “ultimately leading to its demise during release, if her demands were not met”.
